Distributed energy generation installations can have substantial wiring needs. For example, in the solar context, each of the solar panels in an installation can connect to a neighboring one, until the entire chain is connected to a combining device, and inverter. With many rows of solar panels, the number of connected wires, whether thin-walled or cabled wiring, can cause a significant fraction of the cost of system installation to be devoted to wiring. Additionally, the wiring requires proper positioning. Loose, dangling, or slack wiring can potentially result in hazards.
For this reason, wires are frequently managed using tie devices that constrain the wires, such as by holding them against structural members of the installation. Such tie devices are typically made from nylon or similar materials, installed by hand. A nylon tie device can be wrapped around a wire and structural member to constrain the movement of the wire. Nylon devices, however, brittle and break over time when exposed to outdoor ambient environments. Although they can be inexpensive on a per-unit basis, the cost for manual replacement for failed tie devices can be prohibitively expensive.
Additionally, such tie devices can form only a single loop while closing, forcing all wire-structure interactions into a single constraining relationship, which may not be appropriate for all junctions between wire and structural member. For example, where a wire passes a structural member at a right angle, the nylon tie device wrapped around both can impart a curvature to the wire in bending it to be closer to collinear with the structural member. The curvature can adversely affect the wire's lifetime performance.